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February 28, 2007

Apparently
the creative side of the advertising industry is not nearly as
challenging as many of us are led to believe. Just look at the
ad at left.

The man in the picture is no Gucci model, my friends. That
man is a swindler (a liar! a crook! a con artist!), who called up SonntagsZeitung,
a large Swiss weekly, and booked a 2-page, $50k spread of HIMSELF
in a "Gucci ad", and then billed the whole thing to Gucci.
Because the ad was booked close to press time, the paper did not vet
the ad, and low and behold it was nothing more than your average
citizen with a bottle of Gucci perfume photoshopped over his arm.

[Now let me tell you, my Fucci (fake Gucci) alarm bells went off when I
saw the ad. Your average consumer may think this guy looks like a
Gucci model, but this
quasi-creepy looking, no chiseled-chin-having guy with a 5
o'clock
shadow didn't fool me! (for long anyway...hehe).]

MarketingVox reports that the GotMilk campaign is going viral with its attempts to make a milk mustache emoticon popular among teens and young adults. : { ) Anyone?

Unfortunately, for most of us, emoticons are hard to make, and outside
the smiling man :) , the REALLY smiling man :D, the sad man :(, and the
REALLY sad man :,(, they are not widely used. Premade emoticons
on IM and message boards are more frequently utilized, as they give you
dozens of options at the click of a button, and do not require you to
remember a series of random symbols.

Forgetting the fact that I think the emoticon itself resembles a screaming person, I have trouble envisioning a situtation in which teens would actually discuss milk and then
using the emoticon. When would teens insert said icon into conversation
without looking like big ole dorks? "brb, gotta go get some milk :{ )"
"omg, i love milk! lol!!11!! :{ )"

Unless the icon turns into a small photo of Beyonce in a bikini with a
milk mustache I fear this is going to be an uphill battle. Are we
witnessing the limits of the "it will go viral because I say so"
theory?

February 27, 2007

By now everyone's probably seen footage of "Taco Hell" - a late night
video of rats running amuck all over a KFC/Taco Bell in Greenwich
Village. When the cats are away, the mice huge, giant sewer rats will play.

Looks like politicians aren't the only ones completely vulnerable to
real-time viral videos. Within hours after the footage was taken
it was all over YouTube and AdAge reports that over 1,000 bloggers had
mentioned the story. Newspaper articles were written world the
round.

Considering I work for a company that specializes in online brand
protection, promotion and intelligence I don't need to read the whole
AdAge article to know what Yum Brands (owner of Taco Bell and KFC) is
in serious trouble. Here are a few quick steps to getting out of said mess, (or rat infested restaurant as it were):

Step 1: Recognize the magnitude of the problem early on. Online buzz is
like a brush fire, and can spread from YouTube to blogs to mainstream
media in about 2.2 seconds

Step 2: Have a plan. Crisis communication in this day and age MUST involve an internet component. When all hell breaks loose you need to know where you're going, not be picking up the phone book to find a consultant.

Step 3: Come out swinging on the consumers' home turf (in this case, the internet). Look at
Jet Blue's CEO looking all heartfelt on YouTube (seriously, appearing
to care), and take some notes. These sort of responses will (at least for the short term) win ink because of the unique approach, in addition to the content of the message.

Step 4: Flood the market (on and offline!) with good press. (But, let's NOT use the fact that Taco Bell is now e-coli free as a talking point). Word of mouth brand promotion is effective, you want one of those voices out there online to be working for you.

Step 5: Ketchup. Load it up. All that crap tastes better with ketchup.

EDIT: My friend who lives in NYC shared this with me today, "By the way, that combined Taco Bell/KFC is about 50 feet from my house. In a typically prescient moment, I walked by it and actually shivered the night before the story broke. Something just felt wrong. All of this is to say, Al Gore:: Global Warming as Laurie:: rat takeover in taco bell. Stay tuned."

With two prominent political parties in America, there’s a prevailing belief that being bi-partisan is synonymous with being disloyal and weak. Opinion makers continue to preach the need to choose sides — and stick with your choice no matter what. Such is not the thinking man’s way. PoliticalMavens.com is for thinkers.

Look for my left-of-center take on all political and election issues related to the world of marketing and Web 2.0.

February 26, 2007

Beyond Madison Avenue
brings my attention to a untapped, re-emerging market that my friends
and I have joked about for years - the 1980s style cell phone.
Made popular by Zack Morris on Saved By the Bell and other 80s/90s icons, this functional, yet
stylish phone makes a statement without saying a word.

The 80's Brick Cell Phone FY8850 , "Features
1980's look and feel complete with huge battery and long external
antenna. Includes color LCD screen, polyphonic and MP3 ringtones,
speaker phone and long battery life. True to its root, this cell phone
does not have headset, USB connection or car charger jacks." BYM notes that the phone is currently sold out.

Luckily, I still have an original 80s cinder-block sized cell phone,
complete with an over-the-shoulder battery back. My sister found
them at her office just in time for an 80s Prom Party (see photo at right). I'm sure
Verizon will have no issue reconnecting it, especially because they
handle my current-century problems will such finesse and ease.

Stop the presses! Apparently Second Life, the popular
virtual online world, recently suffered its first terrorist
attack. The attack targeted an American Apparel and Reebok outlet
stores, and responsibility was claimed by the Second Life Liberation
Army. SLLA is crying out for "democratic decision making" in
Second Life according to AdRants. I'm serious. You can't make this shit up.

Apparently there have been smaller scale attacks, such as the flying
penises attack on "wealthy Second Life land owner" Anshe Chung during
an "in world" CNet interview. (You can see video HERE - explicit content).

Tila Tequila, of 1.7 million-MySpace-friends-fame dropped her first single this weekend entitled I Love U, which was produced by Lil Jon.

So, does having 1.7 million friends on MySpace do anything for you in the real world? Time will certainly tell, but as AdRants puts it, "Oh wow. Just listened. She might be hot but that song sucks."

I do however find the pop culture MySpace references like, "who the
fuck is this bitch on you page/with her big ass tits up on your top
eight," apt. (I had to listen to the snippet on her page twice to get that down right, my ear drums are bleeeeding.)

February 22, 2007

Despite early statements by GM that they would not
change their controversial Super Bowl Robot suicide ad because it was,
"a story of GM's commitment to quality. It is not intended to offend
anyone," the Lansing State Journal reports that GM has in fact edited the ad in question.

The article reports that, "Now, instead of suicide it tries out
entry-level jobs stocking shelves and parking cars and even has bad
dreams of cars in the scrap yard before waking up."

New Media Strategies, an online brand management firm that tracks
online buzz, ranked the spot as one of the least liked ads of the Super
Bowl - with 46% of online buzz about the spot being unfavorable in
nature as consumers reacted to the suicide aspect, as well as the fact
that the ad does not treat the issue of domestic auto industry layoffs
sensitively. The ad cost more than $5 million to air.

The ad was edited under pressure from the American Foundation for
Suicide Prevention. As AdRants commented a few weeks ago,
"America is officially insane."

February 21, 2007

In the most Rovian move since, well the last creepy thing Karl Rove did, this
Red Cross billboard was spotted in Western New York - urging all of us
to prepare ourselves, because we really don't know when the next
terrorist attack will be. (Though the Red Cross of Greater
Buffalo seems to know: November 9, 2009 as seen on the billboard, as
well as February 26, 2008, January 18, 2009 AND October 7, 2010
according to the website. Fine print indicates the 11/9/09 attack
will be biochemical...I think we need to get some intel agents over to
the Red Cross stat, this could be the big break that Bush is looking
for!)

The site itself is pretty innocuous after you get past the shock of it
all, and provides basics on how to make yourself a survival kit, get
trained in First Aid, and make a plan to follow with your loved ones in
case of an attack. Once everyone in the greater Buffalo area stops WIGGING OUT over this fear mongering billboard, I'm sure they'll get themselves all ready for the big day - which, bt dubs, I would put Vegas odds on NOT occurring in Buffalo, NY anyway (no offense).(Via Boing Boing)